After a successful 23-year career in art auctioneering, Mallika Sagar became the first female auctioneer at the IPL in 2024 in Dubai
For the first time in her two-decade career, Mallika Sagar wore sneakers to work on December 19 last year. Apart from helping her fill the large shoes of British auctioneer Hugh Edmeades, the pair of kicks kept her going during her seven-hour, headline-grabbing debut selling 72 male cricketers for over ₹200 crore in a large arena in Dubai as the Indian Premier League’s (IPL) first woman auctioneer.
The stint came 22 years after she sold baseball memorabilia to a roomful of well-heeled Americans as the first Indian woman auctioneer at Christie’s in New York. “They may have been more than a little surprised to see a young Indian auctioneer who probably knew nothing about their collecting category,” says Sagar. “They were absolutely right.”